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Former Vice President Joe Biden is calling for one of the primary laws defining how Internet content is regulated to be "revoked," adding that the "little creeps" who run some of Silicon Valley's biggest businesses aren't the economic powerhouses they think they are.

"I've never been a fan of Facebook, as you probably know. I've never been a big [Facebook CEO Mark] Zuckerberg fan," Biden began in response to tech questions posed by The New York Times. "I think he's a real problem."

"He [Zuckerberg] knows better," Biden elaborated, telling the Times, "Not only should we be worrying about the concentration of power, we should be worried about the lack of privacy and them being exempt."

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.

At its most basic level, the law draws a line between the platform that hosts content and the generator of the content hosted on it. If something is hinky in a YouTube video, "Google" isn't the company that spoke the contents; the video creator is.

Further Reading

"Section 230 reform" has something of a rallying cry among the far right in recent months. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) last year introduced legislation seeking to amend the law, revoking "the immunity big tech companies receive under Section 230 unless they submit to an external audit that proves by clear and convincing evidence that their algorithms and content-removal practices are politically neutral."

Hawley has company in both chambers of Congress. Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) have also lent public support to the idea of Section 230 reform, as has Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) on the House side.

The cry for reform is not limited to a single party, though. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told Recode last April that section 230 is "a gift" to the tech firms, adding, "I don't think they are treating it with the respect that they should, and so I think that could be a question mark and in jeopardy."

Biden, however, did not call for reforms—he called for abolishing the provision entirely. "You’re not exempt," he told his interviewers. "[The Times] can’t write something you know to be false and be exempt from being sued. But he can. The idea that it’s a tech company is that Section 230 should be revoked, immediately should be revoked, number one. For Zuckerberg and other platforms."

When the NYT pointed out that Section 230 is foundational to the modern Internet, Biden agreed, then continued:

And it should be revoked. It should be revoked because it is not merely an internet company. It is propagating falsehoods they know to be false, and we should be setting standards not unlike the Europeans are doing relative to privacy. You guys still have editors. I’m sitting with them. Not a joke. There is no editorial impact at all on Facebook. None. None whatsoever. It’s irresponsible. It’s totally irresponsible.

It's apparently personal, but not criminal

Biden called particular, but oblique, attention to Facebook's decision not to block political ads that mislead users or tell outright lies, so long as those ads do not engage in obvious attempts at voter suppression. That discussion was kicked off in October, when the Trump campaign aired ads on Facebook making false accusations about Biden. The ads contained baseless claims about Biden's activities in Ukraine and elsewhere that have been repeatedly debunked by both media outlets and also other Republican politicians.

Biden suggested to the NYT that Facebook's choice to allow such ads could amount to defamation, saying that Zuckerberg "should be submitted to civil liability and his company to civil liability, just like you would be here at The New York Times" if the paper were to run demonstrably false stories. Whether Facebook should face any kind of criminal penalties, he added, is less clear.

Further Reading

If Zuckerberg or anyone else at Facebook "engaged in something and amounted to collusion that in fact caused harm that would in fact be equal to a criminal offense, that’s a different issue," Biden added. "That’s possible. That’s possible it could happen. Zuckerberg finally took down those ads that Russia was running. All those bots about me. They’re no longer being run," he continued. Biden seemingly conflated action taken by an opposing campaign with the kind of foreign disinformation action that is indeed rampant across social media.

The tech sector, and Facebook in particular, is overdue for some government intervention, Biden added, drawing a line through history:

The fact is, in every other revolution that we’ve had technologically, it’s taken somewhere between six years and a generation for a government to come in and level the playing field again. All of a sudden, remember the Luddites smashing the machinery in the Midlands? That was their answer when the culture was changing. Same thing with television. Same thing before that with radio. Same thing, but this is gigantic.

And it’s a responsibility of government to make sure it is not abused. Not abused. And so this is one of those areas where I think it’s being abused. For example, the idea that he cooperates with knowing that Russia was engaged in dealing with using the internet, I mean using their platform, to try to undermine American elections. That’s close to criminal.

Intuiting that Biden was still talking about Facebook, the Times interviewer posited that Zuckerberg might not have known at the time how deeply involved Russia was. "He'd argue it and I don't believe him for a second," Biden replied. "Nor do you, in your heart."

Tech on blast

Biden's antipathy for tech did not stop with Facebook; he spoke more widely of his distaste with the sector as well.

"You may recall the criticism I got for meeting with the leaders in Silicon Valley, when I was trying to work out an agreement dealing with them protecting intellectual property for artists in the United States of America," Biden said. "At one point, one of the little creeps sitting around that table, who was a multi—close to a billionaire—who told me he was an artist because he was able to come up with games to teach you how to kill people."

The interviewer asked Biden if he meant video games, and Biden agreed. He went on to say that he was "lectured" at that table by a "senior leader" who claimed that if Biden and Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) moved forward with the bill in question, "they would blow up the network, figuratively speaking. Have everybody contact. They get out and go out and contact the switchboard, just blow it up."

Further Reading

Biden went on to say that there were representatives of seven firms sitting in that meeting, "everyone's there but Microsoft," and he found "you have fewer people on your payroll than all the losses that General Motors just faced in the last quarter, of employees. So don’t lecture me about how you’ve created all this employment."

It is unclear which particular meeting with "little creeps" Biden was alluding to. The references to GM and to intellectual property, however, seem to indicate this meeting took place in 2008, while Biden was still representing Delaware in the Senate. Once he became Vice President in 2009, Biden continued to be deeply involved in copyright law struggles. Early in the first Obama term, Biden promised strong enforcement to the recording industries, and he was a key presence in a 2010 White House push to reform copyright enforcement.

While it's hard to work out the relative economic importance of seven unknown companies that might have been represented at an unknown meeting more than a decade ago, there is no doubt that here in 2020, the tech sector is a massive contributor to the US economy. Four publicly traded companies in US history have passed the $1 trillion valuation mark. Apple was the first to do so, in 2018. Amazon followed later that year, and Microsoft joined the club in 2019. The most recent, Google parent company Alphabet, did so earlier this week.

802 Reader Comments

I think the fools that picked Trump to disturb the status quo have realized their mistake.

LOL. You are optimisticly naive. Trump voters overwhelmingly still support Trump. They are living in a post-fact world. All your "facts" are just libtard talking points to them. I was talking to a Trump voter today who believes Trump reduced the deficit to zero like he promised he would. I pointed out that the deficit expanded under Trump.

He doesn't believe it. He "knows" Trump reduced the deficit to zero. He will be voting to re-elect Trump so he can keep doing good things. Keep in mind this isn't a policy debate or nuanced opinon. It is absolute black and white. The deficit each year has a specific number and that number has increased not decreased.

Vote Bernie Sanders, it's that simple. Don't let it be a contest between Trump and Biden, because that's not much of a choice.

Actually it is. I'm not a big fan of Biden but holy shit is there an ocean of difference between him and fucking Trump.

I agree with you. But if it's Trump vs Biden, the youth will not vote and Trump will be re-elected. And with that the DNC will have made the same exact mistake they made in 2016 by promoting Hilary and sabotaging Sanders. I think they will. I think they will do exactly the same (promote moderate/safe candidate) and I think we'll get 4 more years of Trump because of it.

You don't understand that Sanders will also push otherwise-Democratic voters to Trump, as well. It's not just a one way street.

YOU don't understand that far fewer dem voters will vote Trump if the dem candidate is too progressive for them, than the progressive dem voters disillusioned with a lame candidate will stay home and not vote.

Or did you not look at stats for 2008 or 2012 vs 2016 presidential election?

This is different. We've had 4 years of Trump being a complete disaster. Quite frankly, any "progressive" who would stay home if Biden is the nominee is not a progressive at all, and should be slapped.

The last midterm results and more recent polling all seem to suggest that Dem voters are much more energized than their gop counterparts going into this election. That could change, I suppose, but I don't think you'll see them casting "protest" votes, and you certainly won't see them staying home, this time around.

It's pretty clear that Biden is not a good choice for anyone with a clue.

The idea of holding all Internet providers responsible for everything said anywhere on their services would instantly destroy the Internet.

I'd argue that being paid to show an AD should not be exempted under this. A bunch of nerds telling lies in a group isn't the same as PAYING for adds all over facebook saying the earth is flat vaccines cause autism, and bush did 911.

if you're being paid to relay that information, unsolicited to users at large, you absolutely have a responsibility to the content.

It would be awesome if the majority of the comments here were actually on topic re: Biden vs 230. All this other bitching should go to a strictly political thread.

I do think Biden has a point that 230 has issues but a straight repeal is a very bad idea. I doubt he has a nuanced view on the topic but even if he did it probably wouldn't come through. Unfortunately nuance usually isn't possible in national campaigns these days. I fear that in this political environment any sort of "fix" to the myriad of problems in the DMCA would either make them worse or would throw out the whole thing and make it worse in the opposite direction.

Part of the problem is that the public just doesn't know how bad voter suppression is. Maybe they have images of big dudes with baseball bats turning voters away on election day. Maybe in 1800s. Now it's gotten sophisticated.

SCOTUS just ruled that nobody's going to jail for gerrymandering because gerrymandering is totally kosher.

The US remains the only democracy in the world, as far as I know, that allows political parties to draw electoral boundaries. Everyone else uses independent electoral commissions for that shit, for blindingly obvious reasons.

There still is the option of doing what California did: Ballot measures to take the power of redistricting away from the legislature, and give it to an independent commission.

I'm not a Biden fan and I'm not a Bernie fan, but this kind of letting the perfect be the enemy of the good is exactly how Trump got elected in the first place. You're attitude is EXACTLY why Democrats fail.

The Democrats will nominate someone. Anyone voting for Trump, or throwing a fit and staying home, regardless of who it is, has lost their mind.

Yes, let's do 2016 over again. Let's run the "safe" candidate that no one likes and no one has enthusiasm for. Let's let the party pick their guy.

Nah, we already saw where the Biden road goes in 2016. If you want to risk four more years of Trump then vote for Biden in the primaries. If you want a real chance to get rid of Trump then get behind Bernie, he's the real avatar of change, and change is what the country wants.

Can you even read? I'm not saying who I support. What I am saying is the fucking BernieBros better not fuck up the election like they did by their sulking in 2016. Don't even begin to pretend that Sander's supporters sitting and sulking didn't play into the Trump election.

You like Bernie? Fine, that's your choice. You may have noticed that he's not the only choice. He's old, had at least one heart attack, and there's a strong chance that exactly NONE of his ideas could get past Congress. Those are legitimate concerns for lots of people.

FACT: Bernie supporters didn't torpedo Clinton's run for president; Clinton aimed the gun squarely at her own foot and pulled the trigger. She was one of the most unpopular candidates in the history of the Democratic Party, she was completely out of touch with any portion of the Democratic base that wasn't white, middle-aged and college educated (which is why so few people came out to vote for her), and she patently ignored key midwestern battleground states - despite repeated warnings from the Sanders campaign that doing so could cost her the election.

Clinton ran a terrible campaign, both tactically and strategically. Stop blaming other people for her problems, she's a grown ass woman and failed on her own merits or lack thereof.

Finally, to your fears about 2020, currently only 4% of Sander supporters say they would support Trump over another Democratic candidate. Compare that to 12% of Buttigieg supporters or 10% of Warren's supporters, or 9% of Biden's.

So maybe talk to your friends supporting Buttigieg, because us Sanders fans have our shit sorted, thank you very much.

let’s say you’re watching TV and your butt itches. an ad comes on for Brenda’s Guaranteed Butt-Itch Relieving Elixir. you get your itchy ass up and go buy some. it works, permanently, but only because your butt cheeks fall off.

who do you sue? not vizio.

you sue the guys who ran the ad that got you to take those pills.

it drive me nuts that old farts who can’t be bothered to learn about the world they live in think they should be president and big media corporations give them the time of day as if they were possibly suited to do so.

ads do get regulated, and some get pulled. this never leads to the TV sets being outlawed because some quack ran a bullshit ad.

I'm not sure Biden is going about this the right way, but he is absolutely right that Facebook and other social media platforms need to be held more accountable for the garbage they promote - particularly when it's paid content or advertising.

Facebook makes billions of dollars pushing counterfeit crap, political lies, snake oil, and other garbage and they're not going to stop until it starts costing them real money.

Limit 230 protection to non-profits. Let the Facebook, Google, etc. use most of their ad income to pay for moderation and take responsibility for the results.

OK - I know, that solution falls in to the 'clear, simple, and wrong' school of answers to complex problems, but there are days where I'd be happy to see Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and all of their ilk implode. I'm a bit afraid that if enough people feel that way on enough days, we may actually see a straight-up repeal of 230, so I'd encourage all of those companies to make reforms that are broadly acceptable before govt. truly is empowered by a disgusted public to bring down the hammer.

Say goodbye for ars forums then. No way are the comments on ars worth the moderating cost and liability without 230.

Look I am not saying we shouldn't reform 230 but no one line solution would work at least it wouldn't work without radically disrupting the internet as it exists now. That is my annoyance with Biden. He is just lashing out at facebook and appears clueless to the fact that this is a complex issue. Only two possible scenarios the first is he actually is clueless the second is he knows better but it just pandering with simplistic "solutions" and I have had enough of that from Trump.

THIS. Biden's behavior here is very illuminating. Calling the people he met with "creeps" shows a total lack of respect and unwillingness to work with the industry on a solution, risks alienating a whole industry unnecessarily, and it's the same divisive crap we've been getting from politics for the last 1-2 decades. You don't solve problems by using kindergarden-level name-calling. His total lack of finesse and seeming unwillingness to delve into the issue or to work with consultants to make informed decisions is exactly what we don't need right now.

This is actually a very simple issue, and he's failing to get it right. How can we trust him to make correct and informed decisions in messy global politics?

Vote Bernie Sanders, it's that simple. Don't let it be a contest between Trump and Biden, because that's not much of a choice.

That's some Enlightened Centrism if I've ever seen. Massive false equivalence. I'm not defending Biden, but he's certainly not going to be the threat to America that Trump is and has been.

No joke, Trump is unusually dangerous, and those of us that are engaged understand that. But elections don't turn on people that already hate the other party's new God-King, they turn on whether people that don't usually care get energized.

If you want to get rid of Trump it's time to shift the Overton Window by electing Bernie.

The only good thing that could come out of this is if Biden acknowledged he was wrong in what he said. That would automatically make him better than anyone from the GOP, who double down on absolutely everything now.

What an idiot (aka the typical politician who has no rational understanding of anything that even hints of technology).

230 is the one thing that keeps the CDA at all rational.

What is the thrust of 230? (1) Freedom of speech is good. (2) Don't shoot the messenger.

It needs to be revisited. The proliferation of blatant falsehoods makes that clear.

And it's not like companies like Facebook, whose sole reason for existence is analyzing personality traits and bundling them for sale to advertisers, aren't already clearly capable of identifying such bad actors. Such identification is their core business. They don't tamper with misinformation because it makes them money, and because there's no incentive for them to do so.

I don't like it that politicians, as a general rule and regardless of age, aren't very tech savvy. The issue isn't so much age as it is profession - lawyers to this day tend to prefer paper processes over digital processes. Overwhelmingly, politicians are lawyers.

Instead of complaining about "those darn septigenarians/octigenarians", it might be a better idea to support electoral change - get people with a technical background elected to positions where they can do good. In fact, this didhappen back in the 2018 elections.

If we want the levers of power to be better-used, it's on us to organize and get the right people in the places where power can be used effectively. That's how democracies work in the first place.

Oh, and seriously: check the ageism? It's not nice when people do it to us, we really shouldn't do it back. It doesn't achieve anything.

I'm not sure Biden is going about this the right way, but he is absolutely right that Facebook and other social media platforms need to be held more accountable for the garbage they promote - particularly when it's paid content or advertising.

Facebook makes billions of dollars pushing counterfeit crap, political lies, snake oil, and other garbage and they're not going to stop until it starts costing them real money.

Limit 230 protection to non-profits. Let the Facebook, Google, etc. use most of their ad income to pay for moderation and take responsibility for the results.

OK - I know, that solution falls in to the 'clear, simple, and wrong' school of answers to complex problems, but there are days where I'd be happy to see Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and all of their ilk implode. I'm a bit afraid that if enough people feel that way on enough days, we may actually see a straight-up repeal of 230, so I'd encourage all of those companies to make reforms that are broadly acceptable before govt. truly is empowered by a disgusted public to bring down the hammer.

Say goodbye for ars forums then. No way are the comments on ars worth the moderating cost and liability without 230.

Look I am not saying we shouldn't reform 230 but no one line solution would work at least it wouldn't work without radically disrupting the internet as it exists now. That is my annoyance with Biden. He is just lashing out at facebook and appears clueless to the fact that this is a complex issue. Only two possible scenarios the first is he actually is clueless the second is he knows better but it just pandering with simplistic "solutions" and I have had enough of that from Trump.

Is 230 needed to protect discussions like this? Can someone from Ars answer?

I think the fools that picked Trump to disturb the status quo have realized their mistake.

LOL. You are optimisticly naive. Trump voters overwhelmingly still support Trump. They are living in a post-fact world. All your "facts" are just libtard talking points to them. I was talking to a Trump voter today who believes Trump reduced the deficit to zero like he promised he would. I pointed out that the deficit expanded under Trump.

He doesn't believe it. He "knows" Trump reduced the deficit to zero. He will be voting to re-elect Trump so he can keep doing good things. Keep in mind this isn't a policy debate or nuanced opinon. It is absolute black and white. The deficit each year has a specific number and that number has increased not decreased.

Ninety-five percent of respondents who said they had picked Trump in his first run for office said they could find a reason vote for him again in 2020.

Fuck man I wish voters had realized their mistake. Hell if even 1 in 5 Trump voters were even open to the idea they made a mistake it would be a landslide against Trump. They aren't. They still think Trump is one of them, and sticking it to the libtards, and draining the swamp and all the bullshit Trump peddled to get elected the first time.

I hate to say this but we are all naive. Politicians will say what we want to hear and pander to us in order to be elected. Trump - Drain the swamp. Hilliary - I carry hot sauce in my purse. Every year we believe them, like suckers, and every year there is much disappointment.

It would be awesome if the majority of the comments here were actually on topic re: Biden vs 230. All this other bitching should go to a strictly political thread.

I do think Biden has a point that 230 has issues but a straight repeal is a very bad idea. I doubt he has a nuanced view on the topic but even if he did it probably wouldn't come through. Unfortunately nuance usually isn't possible in national campaigns these days. I fear that in this political environment any sort of "fix" to the myriad of problems in the DMCA would either make them worse or would throw out the whole thing and make it worse in the opposite direction.

So how would we fix section 230? Clearly giving complete and total immunity from user content is not tenable, as we've seen that used to do terrible things.

It would be awesome if the majority of the comments here were actually on topic re: Biden vs 230. All this other bitching should go to a strictly political thread.

I do think Biden has a point that 230 has issues but a straight repeal is a very bad idea. I doubt he has a nuanced view on the topic but even if he did it probably wouldn't come through. Unfortunately nuance usually isn't possible in national campaigns these days. I fear that in this political environment any sort of "fix" to the myriad of problems in the DMCA would either make them worse or would throw out the whole thing and make it worse in the opposite direction.

So how would we fix section 230? Clearly giving complete and total immunity from user content is not tenable, as we've seen that used to do terrible things.

Well lets have a debate on how to reform it. No one sentence "solution" is a solution. It is either ignorance or pandering. It is a complex issue and if Biden had said we need to take a look at reforming it I would applaud him but he didn't he is just saying scrap it to fuck facebook except it would have catastrophic impacts across the internet everywhere user created content exists. It is reckless and stupid.

Yeah killing 230 would literately put the internet out of business. That said I do agree the big boys are trying to get away with doing the bare minimum.

Maybe 230 can be amended with a provision of once you pass a certain revenue or user base size you must implement a more robust moderator system? I mean its one thing to post my crazy anti-vax beliefs on a tiny forum with only a few thousand users. Its an entirely different thing to blast them at a 100 million users for no charge and often no way to truly know who's behind my user handle or the thousand bot accounts backing it.

Microsoft seems to be playing it the smartest. They've comfortably slipped into the shoes IBM once filled and basically just act like a boring ol' utility company.

It's pretty clear that Biden is not a good choice for anyone with a clue.

The idea of holding all Internet providers responsible for everything said anywhere on their services would instantly destroy the Internet.

It would not destroy the Internet. It would almost certainly destroy or decimate a number of current business models. But ya know, the basic business model of "aggregate huge volumes of crap together, skim as much money as possible off, and deny all responsibility when things go wrong" as exemplified by YouTube, Amazon, Facebook, etc? I'm not sure I'd miss it. And the Internet would go on.

I think the takeaway we all need to be thinking about is the realization that when we came up with the rules about how to manage the Internet 20 years ago, the resulting rules are not perfect. In fact, there are some pretty negative outcomes we are now dealing with. I don't like Biden's proposed fixes but something has gotta change. If Biden's proposal isn't a good one, please suggest a better way to deal with some of these issues.

there is no doubt that here in 2020, the tech sector is a massive contributor to the US economy. Four publicly traded companies in US history have passed the $1 trillion valuation mark.

I'm sure this point will be lost in the ensuing political flamefest, but equating market cap with "contributing to the US economy" is a bit of a stretch.

Depending, of course, on your definition of the US economy.

Exactly. And when this bubble bursts and $1 trillion becomes half that or less people will try and find some other way to brush aside reality.

Price does not necessarily equal value. In today's market that's more true than ever, on the wrong side.

To add insult to injury...

Microsoft = 70%Apple = 60%Google = 55%Amazon = 70%

For each company, that is the percentage of current market cap that has come about since Trump was elected. This has more to do with buybacks and tax breaks than it does growing businesses. If these policies are reversed, expect a similar reversal in market cap.

These price trends make the last housing bubble look like toddler time.

I'm not sure Biden is going about this the right way, but he is absolutely right that Facebook and other social media platforms need to be held more accountable for the garbage they promote - particularly when it's paid content or advertising.

Facebook makes billions of dollars pushing counterfeit crap, political lies, snake oil, and other garbage and they're not going to stop until it starts costing them real money.

Limit 230 protection to non-profits. Let the Facebook, Google, etc. use most of their ad income to pay for moderation and take responsibility for the results.

OK - I know, that solution falls in to the 'clear, simple, and wrong' school of answers to complex problems, but there are days where I'd be happy to see Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and all of their ilk implode. I'm a bit afraid that if enough people feel that way on enough days, we may actually see a straight-up repeal of 230, so I'd encourage all of those companies to make reforms that are broadly acceptable before govt. truly is empowered by a disgusted public to bring down the hammer.

Say goodbye for ars forums then. No way are the comments on ars worth the moderating cost and liability without 230.

Look I am not saying we shouldn't reform 230 but no one line solution would work at least it wouldn't work without radically disrupting the internet as it exists now. That is my annoyance with Biden. He is just lashing out at facebook and appears clueless to the fact that this is a complex issue. Only two possible scenarios the first is he actually is clueless the second is he knows better but it just pandering with simplistic "solutions" and I have had enough of that from Trump.

THIS. Biden's behavior here is very illuminating. Calling the people he met with "creeps" shows a total lack of respect and unwillingness to work with the industry on a solution, risks alienating a whole industry unnecessarily, and it's the same divisive crap we've been getting from politics for the last 1-2 decades. You don't solve problems by using kindergarden-level name-calling. His total lack of finesse and seeming unwillingness to delve into the issue or to work with consultants to make informed decisions is exactly what we don't need right now.

This is actually a very simple issue, and he's failing to get it right. How can we trust him to make correct and informed decisions in messy global politics?

Shame on him.

I would suggest the best way to fix the whole issue is to actually enforce laws regarding monopoly power, and breaking up Alphabet and Facebook to start. 230 might need some minor reforms, but Biden's suggestion is pure idiocy.

It's pretty clear that Biden is not a good choice for anyone with a clue.

The idea of holding all Internet providers responsible for everything said anywhere on their services would instantly destroy the Internet.

Respectfully, treating all Internet providers homogeneously may itself be a bit lacking in the clue department, as well. There are clear differences between ISPs, CDNs, cloud infrastructure providers and Facebook (et al). While all of these entities make money by distributing content, Facebook differentiates itself based upon its business model, which depends on their ability to categorize content, show that content to selected audiences, and then sell information about how that content was consumed, and the behavior and characteristics of the viewers of that content. They aren't simply forwarding 1's and 0's.

I'm not sure Biden is going about this the right way, but he is absolutely right that Facebook and other social media platforms need to be held more accountable for the garbage they promote - particularly when it's paid content or advertising.

Facebook makes billions of dollars pushing counterfeit crap, political lies, snake oil, and other garbage and they're not going to stop until it starts costing them real money.

Limit 230 protection to non-profits. Let the Facebook, Google, etc. use most of their ad income to pay for moderation and take responsibility for the results.

OK - I know, that solution falls in to the 'clear, simple, and wrong' school of answers to complex problems, but there are days where I'd be happy to see Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and all of their ilk implode. I'm a bit afraid that if enough people feel that way on enough days, we may actually see a straight-up repeal of 230, so I'd encourage all of those companies to make reforms that are broadly acceptable before govt. truly is empowered by a disgusted public to bring down the hammer.

Say goodbye for ars forums then. No way are the comments on ars worth the moderating cost and liability without 230.

Look I am not saying we shouldn't reform 230 but no one line solution would work at least it wouldn't work without radically disrupting the internet as it exists now. That is my annoyance with Biden. He is just lashing out at facebook and appears clueless to the fact that this is a complex issue. Only two possible scenarios the first is he actually is clueless the second is he knows better but it just pandering with simplistic "solutions" and I have had enough of that from Trump.

Is 230 needed to protect discussions like this? Can someone from Ars answer?

Yes. Without it if say I slandered (libel since its text) Bidens name with a rumor like, "Biden has a secret sex dungeon at Comet Ping Pong". If Ars didn't immediately (and even that may not be fast enough) take it down then Biden could sue them for publishing my unsubstantiated rumor.

Vote Bernie Sanders, it's that simple. Don't let it be a contest between Trump and Biden, because that's not much of a choice.

What is wrong with you?

That's a serious question by the way. Biden has the potential to be a bad President. Trump is a threat to American democracy. If you think those to things are "close", congrats, you've bought into Republican propaganda.

Agree. I'm not crazy about any of the current crop of Dem candidates, but my vote this year will go to whoever is not Trump. Removing this megalomaniac from office is the top priority.

This is exactly right. I am sick to death of Democrats spouting "If <insert preferred candidate here> doesn't get the nomination TRUMP WILL WIN!!!111!1QAq1@!!!!!"

It's about time Democrats grew a spine, learned a little party discipline and vote for whoever gets the nomination. If Bernie gets the nomination, I'm voting for Bernie. If Biden gets the nomination, I'm voting for Biden. If the Democrats manage to nominate Alfred E. Neuman, I'm voting for Alfred E. Neuman. Period.

Because the absofuckingluetly ONLY issue in this election is defeating Trump.

It would be awesome if the majority of the comments here were actually on topic re: Biden vs 230. All this other bitching should go to a strictly political thread.

I do think Biden has a point that 230 has issues but a straight repeal is a very bad idea. I doubt he has a nuanced view on the topic but even if he did it probably wouldn't come through. Unfortunately nuance usually isn't possible in national campaigns these days. I fear that in this political environment any sort of "fix" to the myriad of problems in the DMCA would either make them worse or would throw out the whole thing and make it worse in the opposite direction.

So how would we fix section 230? Clearly giving complete and total immunity from user content is not tenable, as we've seen that used to do terrible things.

Well lets have a debate on how to reform it. No one sentence "solution" is a solution. It is either ignorance or pandering. It is a complex issue and if Biden had said we need to take a look at reforming it I would applaud him but he didn't he is just saying scrap it to fuck facebook except it would have catastrophic impacts across the internet everywhere user created content exists.

If we were to reform 230, I'd start by making a distinction between paid and unpaid speech. If you're paying for prominence/placement of content, the internet company has some culpability. But, they're getting cash, they can afford to do a little work policing that stuff. If I put up a random Ars comment/youtube video/whatever, the provider is protected.

To the extent hateful content is profitable to advertise alongside, Internet companies might still promote the material, but I think it's a big step past being actively paid to run the content. And really, Google and Co. mostly try to distance themselves from the worst content anyways, because the big brands don't want to be advertising next to it. Cut down on the financial incentives and I bet you'd find Facebook suddenly a lot better at managing this stuff.

I do agree the laws around internet content need reform. Facebook makes money like a publisher of people's content, but is not subject to laws proportionately. In my opinion, ISPs need to be classified as utility providers, which protects them from liability for the content, provided they act neutrally like any other utility. After that, I do think sites like Facebook and YouTube need to be considered as publications and regulated as such. I hate that people so easily conflate Facebook with the internet.

It would not destroy the Internet. It would almost certainly destroy or decimate a number of current business models. But ya know, the basic business model of "aggregate huge volumes of crap together, skim as much money as possible off, and deny all responsibility when things go wrong" as exemplified by YouTube, Amazon, Facebook, etc? I'm not sure I'd miss it. And the Internet would go on.

This...is actually a very interesting point, right here.

Let's be honest: we don't like to think too hard about it, but the internet really is predicated on data acquisition and mining, in pursuit of ad revenue. This is the reason why YouTube exists and finds ways to screw over its creators, this is why FaceBook exists and is so adept at screwing over democracy and societies, this is why Twitter exists and is so adept at fucking over the concept of humans having IQ (admittedly, with some actual help from real humans on that one.)

The reason this stuff is free, is because our activity can be traced back to us, and sold to the highest bidder - no matter who that bidder may be.

It takes some serious courage to look at the situation and say, "this isn't good, and maybe we should scrap this system." While Biden poorly communicated that - as is his idiom - he's not necessarily wrong.

And yes, such a change would have dire consequences for a number of things most of us use - Google, YouTube, Twitter, FaceBook, etc. That being said, those consequences may be preferable to maintaining our current path where fraud, misinformation, and overt acts of espionage are par for the course.

Do we need the ability to popularly author video, and thought, and music, and more? Yes, yes we do. While a change in status quo would be disruptive - if not destructive - to repositories of these works that currently exist, I argue that what we will see is not so much a mass die-off, but rather a restructuring and evolution.

We've already seen this with the copyright issues on YouTube. Once upon a time, creators could live off ad revenue. With the more restrictive automated anti-piracy measures YouTube has employed, many YouTubers have switched to using Patreon to more reliably fund their operations, and refusing to run ads (not that companies fail to get ads onto those videos that they then profit from...but whatever.)

In conclusion: While the idea of abolishing "for-your-data" business models is certainly inconvenient, it's not necessarily bad, and may need to happen. Indeed, the ecosystem itself has been adapting for the past few years. It's not as crazy of an idea as it may initially appear.

OK, I'll delve into the politics and set the record straight. There's people like DarthSlack and Satitistical blaming the 2016 election loss on "BernieBros" and that they are crazy and will throw the election by not voting or whatever. This is just bullshit. First, stop perpetuating the myth of the BernieBro. The guy has the highest amount of female donors and volunteers than any candidate out there, and that included all the women current and formerly running. He's also a very outspoken feminist who has been fighting for women's rights for decades. The idea that a bunch of sexist men are what constitutes most of his support is just stupid based on this fact. Or what? A bunch of "BernieBros" are staunch fighters for women's rights and support the objectively most feminist candidate in decades? This is media speak. Don't fall for it. On the same week they criticized his campaign for being too white and not having diverse support, then when the polling came out, they criticized him for his following being "too urban", which we know what that means.

Second, 12% of Sanders supporters in the primaries didn't vote for Clinton in the general. This is a goddamn record low in case you didn't know. If you go to past elections 25% of Clinton supporters went for McCain. So I would defer that if you think "BernieBros" are crazy, then by definition the supporters for literally every other Democratic candidate are outright mental asylum patients, as they are twice as likely to vote for a Republican than to vote for the Democrat who wins over whoever they supported in the primaries. Fuck, Bernie people are even more likely to swallow the pill and vote Democrat than Republicans are for their own! I think it was Statistical who said Republicans just hold the line at 95%. Bullshit again, 13% of McCain supporters went for Obama. Note that McCain won the primary. So Bernie supporters, after he lost the primary in a mess of documented cheating against him, were more likely to vote for Hillary than McCain supporters, after he actually won the nomination, voted for him over Obama. That's the percentages we're dealing with here.

This going from one party to another after the primaries happens all over the place every time. That's politics. Bernie Sanders has a following that does it the least, and that's an objective, measurable fact. Probably because they were more aware of policy and the implications of a Trump administration than the followers of any other candidate are, but that's just my opinion, you can offer a different one to explain why they are the least party switchers of all after a primary loss. If Clinton, or a potential Biden, can't win the general, it's not because of the record low switch from Bernie's base. It's because they couldn't gather enough turnout to go vote for them in places that swung the electoral college, and that's squarely on them. However, it's a lot easier to start blaming everyone else than taking responsibility for your own failures, like not setting foot in a few states which went Trump by a few thousands of votes because you just took them for granted in the most entitled way possible, while Trump went there and hammered his message of fake economic populism.

How many Clinton voters do people realistically think would've voted Sanders had he been the one winning the nomination? I would like an honest answer. We know 25% went for McCain in the general when she lost against Obama. So seriously, how many would've gone Trump? Because for the life of me I can't see that number being lower than the 12% of Bernie's people. Stop blaming others when you fail to convince the voters, and stop perpetuating the stupid myth that everyone is rational and will vote for the Democrat who wins except those crazy BernieBros, because if that's your definition of rational, they were the most rational of all Democratic primary voters in modern history.

It's pretty clear that Biden is not a good choice for anyone with a clue.

The idea of holding all Internet providers responsible for everything said anywhere on their services would instantly destroy the Internet.

I'd argue that being paid to show an AD should not be exempted under this. A bunch of nerds telling lies in a group isn't the same as PAYING for adds all over facebook saying the earth is flat vaccines cause autism, and bush did 911.

if you're being paid to relay that information, unsolicited to users at large, you absolutely have a responsibility to the content.

This 100x over. I don't know why section 230 would even apply in this case. When Zuck accepts money to run an ad he absolutely needs to accept some responsibility for the content of that ad. It is nothing like being responsible for random user content.

The issue I have with sec 230 is that on one hand platform owners may moderate whatever they want to, but at the same time they aren't responsible for anything on their platform. This is a pretty comfy position of having all the rights (and power) to censor but no responsibility that comes with that.

But a complete repeal of sec 230 is not reasonable either. Sites being responsible for all the dumb shit idiots post => simply close comments. Human moderators that would have to accept every comment before publishing are too expensive, especially when they screw up.

Perhaps the easiest "solution" would be that sites become responsible for what they opt to censor and not censor, with full history of all posts (or whatever) available to review to independent organization. With great power comes great responsibility. ((That is, EU-like responsible, with hefty fines. Not "oops, we will try to not do it again ... today"))

The tyranny of old people legislating things they don't understand. It doesn't help that politicians are like 70%+ lawyers so it isn't even like there are a lot of former network engineers in Congress that might still remember stuff from their former careers.

203 may not be perfect but a complete repeal would simply end the internet as we know it. Hell this comment section wouldn't exist. Conde Nast lawyers would simply end it the day 203 is repealed. Not just future comments, but the entire forum, and all historical comments. Not read only just gone. No way is a comment section worth unlimited financial liability.

Repealing 203 would be like passing a law saying cellphone companies are financially liable anytime a criminal uses a cellphone in furtherance of a crime.

It is kinda sad the only thing Republican and Democratic politicians can agree on shows neither party has anyone who has a clue how the internet works.

It's not so much lawyers vs engineers but lawyers vs lawyers. I believe you'd get better results from a supporter of civil liberties and a criminal defense attorney than you would with yet one more prosecutor. But we're such a vengeful frightened people that prosecutors end up consistently being the ones to win office.

Vote Bernie Sanders, it's that simple. Don't let it be a contest between Trump and Biden, because that's not much of a choice.

Um... they all appear unable to pass the mini-mental state examination to check for dementia. I've heard all three fail to remember where they were, what they were talking about, or rationally deal with stressful situations in public appearances or interviews.

Not sure I want any of them deciding the fate of our country, nor anyone advocating putting them in power so they can manipulate them.

Vote Bernie Sanders, it's that simple. Don't let it be a contest between Trump and Biden, because that's not much of a choice.

Congrats. You now have the Sane tag attached to your username.

It is a good look.

Ftfy.

Joe Biden is slipping and it shows. Shame that any democratic nomanee I'd be tempted to vote for has been shot down by nominees that want to drastically increase spending, drastically increase taxation; increase regulation that won't be enforced but lay groundwork for outright draconic laws, and won't talk about how they'll implement anything. Just the pipedream of it working.

I'm not sure Biden is going about this the right way, but he is absolutely right that Facebook and other social media platforms need to be held more accountable for the garbage they promote - particularly when it's paid content or advertising.

Facebook makes billions of dollars pushing counterfeit crap, political lies, snake oil, and other garbage and they're not going to stop until it starts costing them real money.

Limit 230 protection to non-profits. Let the Facebook, Google, etc. use most of their ad income to pay for moderation and take responsibility for the results.

OK - I know, that solution falls in to the 'clear, simple, and wrong' school of answers to complex problems, but there are days where I'd be happy to see Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and all of their ilk implode. I'm a bit afraid that if enough people feel that way on enough days, we may actually see a straight-up repeal of 230, so I'd encourage all of those companies to make reforms that are broadly acceptable before govt. truly is empowered by a disgusted public to bring down the hammer.

Say goodbye for ars forums then. No way are the comments on ars worth the moderating cost and liability without 230.

Look I am not saying we shouldn't reform 230 but no one line solution would work at least it wouldn't work without radically disrupting the internet as it exists now. That is my annoyance with Biden. He is just lashing out at facebook and appears clueless to the fact that this is a complex issue. Only two possible scenarios the first is he actually is clueless the second is he knows better but it just pandering with simplistic "solutions" and I have had enough of that from Trump.

Is 230 needed to protect discussions like this? Can someone from Ars answer?

Yes. Without it if say I slandered (libel since its text) Bidens name with a rumor like, "Biden has a secret sex dungeon at Comet Ping Pong". If Ars didn't immediately (and even that may not be fast enough) take it down then Biden could sue them for publishing my unsubstantiated rumor.

Even less extreme things would open ars to financial liability. In the comments for a product (say a BEV) someone astroturfing for the competitor could make up believable but false claims about the car (underestimate longevity, overestimate charging time). Ars would be liable as publisher of those false claims. Policing all possibly false claims by users would be next to impossible.

There is zero chance any web property anywhere would allow any user created content if you just scrapped 230. The internet would still exist but it would be a lot more like traditional media and less of an interactive system. Things like stackoverflow and wikipedia would be dead overnight.

To even suggest a straight up repeal of 230 is asinine and shows a complete lack of thought on the issue. We probably need section 230 reform but that is going to be a long complex process and whatever comes out that is unlikely to make everyone (anyone?) happy.